The Finale

First of all, how lucky was I to get to spend three weeks with my terrific daughter?  

I learned a bunch of things I didn’t know before I got to Japan, despite months of research. Japan is as confusing as it is convenient.  I read that somewhere and it really rings true.  

It’s seriously disorienting for the language to be different in sight and sound.  I think it would take a really long time to get used to and I don’t think I ever did get used to it so walked around confused and low key causing a scene every day.  

Futons and buckwheat pillows are more comfortable than I expected.

You can spend months planning by talking to friends who live or have lived in Japan,  and scouring the internet and social media and you will still not figure everything out and will miss out on a ton.  It’s the most FOMO place I’ve ever been.  You’re always going to wonder if you missed a better town or experience.  

The public baths are an affirming and body positive experience. Even though it’s blazing hot outside and the bath water is also hot, you leave feeling refreshed and squeaky clean.

I like managing complicated transportation scenarios and normally thrive in this environment but Japan got me turning in circles, even though it’s a really easy system to actually navigate. I overthought the train stations and found them really confusing until I fully realized that the English signing is pretty good and google maps is totally accurate.  It’s also about the sheer number of people in the train stations in the bigger cities, it’s like a hive…so orderly and crowded. In some places there’s help for tourists, like in Hiroshima an English speaking employee approached us in the ticket line and wrote down exactly what train we needed on a slip of paper to give to the ticket counter and there were dedicated foreign ticket buyer lines.

The difference between a 21 year old traveling brain and the 55 year old traveling brain is vast.  Compared to Maya it was like I had dementia.  The last time we traveled together was summer 2019 when we went to Ecuador for three weeks.  She was 16 then and still like a kid needing her parent to guide her on how to do things abroad.  Now she is 21 and a very seasoned  independent  traveler because when she was 19 she solo backpacked Laos, Vietnam, Thailand, and Malaysia, this girl really knows what she is doing!  It was an adjustment to see her in this context as an adult.

Food can be pretty inexpensive and a great a meal from 7/11 eaten in the hostel common area would be really satisfying and about $4 per person for a variety of foods to share.  At least that’s what we found at the beginning of the trip.  By the middle of the trip, the convince store meals turned into more like $6 or $7 per person so we decided that two bowls of spicy ramen for the same price was just as economical.   Sushi meals came in about $9 per person for a lot of food.  

I was surprised at how it took half the trip for me to get into the groove of traveling here. It could have been the slow start due to being pretty sick and needing to lay very low in Niseko for a few days. I haven’t been sick on a trip since Madras (Chennai ), India in 1994.  

Visiting a friend who lives in another country is a very fun thing to do because they already know about everything! 

90% of people wears masks. I think a lot of Japanese people already wore masks before COVID but maybe not this many? 

Japanese women are serous about their sun protection. They wear arm sleeves, gloves, and sometimes face and neck coverings.  I always felt woefully underdressed.  Japan is for sure a roller suitcase destination more than a backpacker place.

Public bathrooms are easily found and are spotless. There’s also a privacy button that plays the sound of birds, running water, or music so other people can't hear your offensive toilet sounds.

I only learned 4 words- thank you, hello, excuse me, and water. I know thats pretty lame.  I kept wanting to speak with people in Spanish.

Shinkansen trains are surprisingly quite expensive, we paid $110 each for a 3 hours trip from Okayama to Tokyo  in many cases flying is cheaper if you can purchase a ticket in advance.  Even though the trains are really comfortable the 7 hours Shinkansen we took gave me a woozy headache. 

It was harder than I thought to keep up with finding train station stamps for my book. I was too focused on figuring out what was happening around me to have room for extra missions.  I started out strong with collecting stamps then completely gave up somewhere along the way. 

There’s no jay walking and no one will cross the street until the pedestrian ok to walk sign lights up, even if there are no cars or other people as far as the eye can see.  We didn’t see one person break these rules.  I think there’s a very hefty fine if you get caught.  

Must haves:

A portable phone battery . You will use your phone for the very crucial functions of google translate and maps. A bandana or washcloth in your day bag, Japanese bathrooms don’t have hand towels.

If you’re wondering how much this trip cost in USD, here’s the breakdown for 21 days in Japan, for two adults not including the flights from the US:

$910 for accommodation, we had six free nights borrowing a friends apartment in Niseko so we only had to pay accommodation for 15 nights. We stayed in a combination of bunks in a hostel, private room in a hostel, and low cost roykans.  

$ 1102 for food. We always bought our yogurt and fruit breakfast the night before to eat at our accommodation. We normally went out for one restaurant meal a day and the third meal would be light fare from a convenience store.  We had one big splurge meal in Niseko. I don’t drink, and Maya paid for her own alcohol so I don’t have stats for that.

$1120 for transportation. This included a flight from Sapporo to Sendai, Shinkansen trains from Yamagata to Hiroshima, another Shinkansen from Hiroshima to Naoshima, then to Tokyo. Also included are  local JR and metro trains, trolleys, and ferries.

$272 for activities. This was mostly museum entrance fees, electric bike rental, the jazz club, and Teamlab Borderless in Tokyo.

So that’s $3404 for 21 days in Japan for two people who also had six free nights in a friend’s apartment.  We spent an average of $162 a day, or about $81 per person.  Per my usual, I was pretty restrained in my spending, I would think an average person would spend significantly more on activities and splash out meals.

Not added into the calculation is the $202 I spent for shopping and souvenirs. I went crazy for ceramics on Kappabashi Street and bought several vintage yukatas. 

We may have missed cherry blossom season but the hydrangeas were spectacular.

Thanks Japan, for putting up with me,  I know I was a lot.

It’s Tokyo Again

Four days in Tokyo just about wore me down to nothing.  It’s a 25,000 steps a day kind of place.  I’d done so much planning and navigating for this trip that by the time we got here I turned that job over to Maya.  She really did a great job getting us all over the city on the JR and Tokyo Metro trains using google maps.  The public transportation is confusingly convenient like everything else here.  Maps will tell you exactly what platforms, times, routes, and even which car to get in for the quickest transfer. Then, all you have to do is look up and there are signs.  We only made one minor error the entire time, which was my fault anyway.   

Our main purpose for Tokyo was to shop and eat.  We only went to one attraction, Teamlabs borderless digital art experience.  It’s an immersive and constantly evolving digital art space.  Unique but overrated.

Koenji turned out to be a cool part of town to base ourselves in.  There's thrift shops galore but all are highly curated and focused on American 2nd hand clothes.  The other good shopping area for Maya was Harajuku which was high end street wear, American thrift clothes, or Harajuku club kid which was her favorite.  But we liked Koenji for its artsy/grungy aesthetic. 

This post wouldn’t be complete without food pictures.  We took another suggestion from Sean and Noriko’s noodle guide and had spicy ramen at Kikanbo.  There was an unusual dark underworld vibe to it with drumming and red lights to add to the hot and spicy food.  

More Tokyo

We are staying is the cutest hostel, Grapehouse Koenji.  It’s a hostel for only women and has a very calm vibe, located in the super cool Koenji neighborhood.  A handmade onigiri for breakfast and we were on our way.

We spent the whole day shopping around in Shibuya and even though I bought some pretty cool stationary and some other random stuff it was way too much like Times Square.   The Shibuya Scramble Crossing is an iconic tourist attraction in Tokyo where people pour into the streets from all directions.  I don’t know why this attracts so much attention, but it’s famous and we were there.

Also famous is the Genki Sushi conveyor belt sushi place.  It was pretty good,  by US standards anyway.  It was bright, not so clean in a trashy way, and loud with tourists.  We ate our fill for only $4.50 each.  The ordering is kinda cool on an iPad, then the conveyor belt brings it straight to your spot on the counter. If I never go back to Shibuya I won’t be sad.

Back in Koenji we went to Poem Cafe, a really cute place where we had the whipped cream fruit sandwiched on fluffy white bead and the best iced coffee with whipped cream that I’ve ever had.

The evening ended with a subway ride out to Ikebukuro Station to eat at Kissui, a ramen place that makes its broth with roasted fish stock.  It was so extremely excellent with deep flavor, and not a hint of fishy taste.  My friends Sean and Noriko Sakamoto wrote a Tokyo Noodle Guide almost 20 years ago that featured this place.  It was so worth the trip.

At most ramen places there’s a ticket machine where you put your money in, hit the button for what you want, and give the ticket to the person behind the counter when you sit down.  Sometimes there’s an English translation at the kiosk and sometimes not.

There’s going to be more Tokyo tomorrow if you want to come back and check it out.

Tokyo

It’s certainly a big change of pace to arrive in Tokyo after all of the small and mid size places we’ve been.  Tokyo is an absolute mob, just swarmed with international and domestic tourists, and of course 14 million people live here.  We have the best intentions of arriving at Tokyo Station and stashing our bags in a locker so we could go to the Oedo Antique Market near the station.  We checked every bank of lockers which took about an hour of huffing heavy packs in the intense heat and crowds…. and they were all full.   Did I find out later that there are luggage storage places we could have booked online a short walk from the station. Yes, of course there are, but this is the land of FOMO and IYKYK so we missed out. We gave up going to the antique market and took the subway to our hostel, dropped the bags there, had another bowl of spicy ramen, and went to the other festival I had planned for the day, the Earth Garden Summer Festival in Yoyoji Park.

Have you heard of the Tokyo Rockabillies?  We thought they were just a social media phenomenon because their videos kept showing up on our Instagram and what not, but they are for real and have been dancing on Sundays in Yoyoji Park for more than 20 years.  Their dance style is like ska meets country line dance meets sock hop. We didn’t know they would be there and were so happy to have had the chance to see them up close!

Across the street was the festival we aimed for which was this funny trifecta of Latin America, Middle Eastern, and hippy combo.  You had one stage blasting reggaeton, one with belly dancers, and the other with R & B.  We headed for some shopping to the Harijuku area, and what a circus! There were three flamboyantly dressed people holding signs advertising a fashion design pop up shop.  We followed them down a little alley to a tiny store that had all their projects.  Maya found a cute top which she wore right out of the store.  They asked to take a picture with her for their socials, it was super cute.

That’s day one of four in Tokyo.  We are getting a late start today to rest our feet and hydrate before commencing the day of shopping and eating activities.